Flight Rising Discussion

Gonna be real, I've been on FR since 2014. And legitimately no matter how many years it's been the suggestions forum without fail is the most unfriendly place on the site

And I just don't get it, I don't see this as a problem on other pet sites I've played, I legit never see people swarm and old suggestion that a new player makes for hours, with like 10 pages full of no supports, often times just pointing at the first person who crassly wave it away's reason.

Or the really intense bad takes people have, where they get heated even if you suggest something reaalllllyyy basic like a giving tree mechanic. They'll find a way to not support it LOL.

Or you'll have people just totally unwilling to engage in a conversation, to get mad over pings or quotes but still want to leave very strongly opinionated posts.

And every time, with out fail there's a new player who gets confused, upset and wants to either leave the game or doesn't understand what they did wrong to get such a strong reaction.

Of course, PLEASE don't call any users out but why is the suggestion subforum like this?

Like I think it's probably a rite of passage at this point, to suggest something unpopular/said before and to immediately get swarmed and overwhelmed with replies. And god forgive if you happen to actually try and have a conversation over it. They just get more heated.

Honest question too, how many times have you been in that situation, or seen it happened and cringed at the onslaught of negativity?

I'm remembering that one time when some alleged old lady was on the suggestions forum suggesting a mechanic that was unneeded. I said something along the lines of "This is understandable for a new player" which wasn't meant to be rude and most people siding with me didn't see it as rude, though I admit it could come off as such. But this (allegedly) old lady went on to say how she wasn't new and that her computer got stolen and she was so sick of young whippersnappers like me (user age isn't accessible in this game so she didn't know if I was young or not) being rude to elders and that if she ever had someone talk to her like that in real life she was slap them and just going on and on and on and on... Even said I was, and I quote, "a few bricks short of a full load".

In the end I was literally apologizing and she went "we weren't talking to you" (even though they were talking about me specifically) and wound up blocking me. I had maybe 40 pages of people defending me after that before a mod came in and locked it. So on one hand it comes from both sides, and if you're actively a wordIcan'tsayonthiswebsite people will know, but yeah. The suggestions forum can be rough.

Like you already said before, it's mostly ticked off people who don't consider that new players have absolutely no idea the forum is like this, or don't check, or don't notice. It's rough, but understandable, but not true justification.

Edit: Afterthought just to say I'm pretty sure it was a 50/50 split on whether people believed it was a troll or an actual "okay grandma let's get you to bed", hence my "allegedly". It genuinely could go either way.

Toxic is the wrong word I think. People are just very blunt in their opinions there since it's one of the only places on FR that ENCOURAGES debate. I always sort of look at it as an outlet for all the aggression and sort of... just, unpleasantry that would otherwise creep onto the rest of the site. Honestly I'd just be grateful that the more rude interactions are sort of gated over there.

The suggestions forum is only "toxic" if you don't know how to handle people disagreeing with you.

Unfortunately this mindset is becoming quite commonplace thanks to the likes of Twitter and other social media which turns every minor disagreement of opinions into a personal attack.

In response to repeat suggestions, lots of regulars in the Suggestions forums have even provided links to previous "repeat" threads so that new players can review the discussions that went on there and better understand the conversation they've unknowingly come in on.

I don't know why you're presenting players giving their own personal reasons for not supporting something as players coming up with "reasons to hate anything" or "bad takes". The entire point of the Suggestions forum is to have respectful discussions about potential game features and changes and that includes both agreements and disagreements.

Edit: This is not to say there isn't the occasional player being very toxic to discussion (like the Grandma example Niceless posted about or that player that insisted that players who didn't help their flights win Dom were "lazy") but they are not representative of the group as a whole and it's really not fair to judge an entire forum by one or two outliers?

I've been to the suggestions forum maybe 3 times in the... 6 years I've been on this site. Every time I feel like this [emoji=coatl scared size=2] before spinning on my forum-heel and speeding out of there. Things can go from 0-100 real fast there and it's not something I want to make a habit of seeing =/ edit: I in no way mean that Suggestions are the "dark side of the forums" or anything like that. Without suggestions I can only imagine where the site would be, it's just not the subforum for me based on my admittedly limited time spent lurking there.

I've been victim of "posted before :/ search first" waves before. People are very impolite there, and the threads about big things can get horrible. I don't go on there anymore, in fear someone's going to go "THIS WILL RUIN THE ECONOMY YOU ARE DUMB BAD. STUPID. THIS IS SO BAD BECAUSE [BLANK]" or "this was said before :/" x50.

I don't get it either. I wish people were nicer there

[quote name="HappyAccidents" date="2022-05-07 17:50:03" ] I always sort of look at it as an outlet for all the aggression and sort of... just, unpleasantry that would otherwise creep onto the rest of the site. [/quote] That's kind of the reason why I used the word toxic tbh. If it's being used as an outlet for aggression then it's not really a safe place? I think I'd prefer one of those post your thoughts or, rant topics for outlets to stress and stuff, because in those cases it's not being directed at other players. In the suggestions forum, we're supposed to suggest and talk about why those suggestions might be good ideas, or bad or how those things can be fixed. Not a place where we take out our emotions on other users under the pretense of disagreeing with them.

Because the very nature of the suggestion forum is to hash out ideas, to bring up points that OP may not have brought up, and to have a back-and-forth discussion on the positives and negatives of an idea.

In general chat or dragon share and the like, generally the conversation is all people with the same viewpoints, or people talking about a common interest, not people actively negating your ideas or providing their own countering ideas.

Although as this thread is a good example of right now, there's still people who do disagree and butt heads outside of suggestions, it's just a smaller percentage of the threads overall! But uh. Plague drama threads. Gene like/dislike threads. People countering each other and getting heated over it happens in all the categories.

The lack of tone indicators and not being face-to-face means that when someone says something counter to your point, it can come across as a personal attack or being blunt and rude, because, yeah, they're disagreeing with you. That's unexpected! How dare they. Now you aren't having a discussion, you're *defending* yourself.

There are definitely people who DO respond back in a rude way, but in general, it's on topics that have been brought up over and over again, and people don't want to see it again. It's also why all the phoatlshops are quarantined in one thread now- people got sick of seeing the same threads, over and over and over. Staff just don't shut down the repeat threads or corral them into one place in the suggestions forum, because they've got a weird hands-off policy in suggestions that they don't have in general. :T

[quote name="Twizz" date="2022-05-07 17:52:56" ]The entire point of the Suggestions forum is to have respectful discussions about potential game features and changes and that includes both agreements and disagreements. [/quote] I agree very much with you actually, perhaps are experiences are very different. But I'm not the only one who has this issue, and I don't think bringing up twitter is really a part of the conversation. I can't point you to any examples it's been years and it would be wrong to do that to begin with but a lot, and I mean a lot of users feel opposite to this, and when that many users do? I think it's fair to say it's a bit of an unpleasant spot. Again, I've been on a lot of other sites and never had this issue.

i wish people on that forum didn't act like they were being held hostage to reply to the "same old suggestions" over and over again. it's a really weird thing, i feel. as if new players speaking their mind is a personal slight to them. it's gotten to the point that other regulars have to get the first post in to warn the OP of the oncoming stampede. surely that speaks of some kind of attitude problem, doesnt it?

whatever's going on in there, it makes the suggestion forums a literal battle to work through. which sucks because theres AMAZING suggestions there, wonderful discussions, even some great discourse (in the literal 'debating back and forth' sense of the word) that gets overshadowed by this horrible attitude. i feel like it's kind of ridiculous coming from certain people who i've watched act this way on the suggestion forums for literally almost an entire decade.

i also dislike how amazing and fun suggestions often get shut down by the "devs shouldnt waste their time on this" argument. i think that's a valid thing to consider, but there's nothing wrong with people spitballing about their dream features, if FR ever had the time, money or dev resources to complete. we arent in charge of FR's prioritization and finances, they can do that themselves, and we should be free to think about those "what ifs" so if it ever comes to be, they have all of our feedback to look back on. i think those are typically my favourite threads, thinking about those huge "what could FR be?" type suggestions.

all in all, suggestions as a forum is a great idea and has some wonderful ideas. but some specific sects of the users there have some bizarre ideas of how to treat other people and how to encourage discussion and i often just disregard the bulk of them. i'll even sometimes reply on threads that people have shot down to try and encourage some more discussion because i WANT to see what new players have to say! a fresh set of eyes can be a blessing, sometimes.

(just saying i realize my own post here is a bit hypocritical on the aggressiveness front and i totally respect that, LOL. i think i just get frustrated at how much things devolve in there)